WE COME THROUGH THE BODY NOT FROM IT
Below is the video that was presented during the my induction in The Hall of Honor of Prenatal science 12th November 2023

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I am Jaap van der Wal. Officially: J. C. van der Wal, MD, PhD. I was born on the 17th of February 1947. In 1973 I  graduated from medical school.  After that I specialized in anatomy and embryology and lectured in these disciplines at the medical schools of the universities of Utrecht and Maastricht (The Netherlands) and at various paramedical training colleges (such as for physiotherapy, nursing and midwifery), but I have also worked in medical research. I received my Ph. D. for a dissertation on human proprioception (sense of posture and locomotion). This concerns my other main interests, i.e. the question: What moves us? What motivates us to move? In this context I became during recent years more and more involved in research as to function and meaning of the fascia and connective tissue in the human body. This resulted in several presentations a.o. at the 2nd International Fascia Congress in Amsterdam including related publications in journals. In this work I so t say continued with the ‘trans-anatomical’ thinking that started in my first period of research (eighties and nineties) in which I and my colleagues introduced a functional description of the fascia as an architecture of connecting and shaping space by means of connective and muscle tissue constituted by ‘dynaments’ instead of muscles and so-called ligaments.

My main interest, however, is the development of the human embryo along with everything related to this, such as evolution and genetics, and all that in context with the image of man and philosophy of science. I regularly publish articles on these subjects. I was co-editor of the report ’Zit er toekomst in ons DNA?’ (’Is there future in our DNA?’), 1993 and of ’En toen was er DNA’ (’And then there was DNA’), 1999.  Important sources of inspiration for me are the anthroposophy of Rudolf Steiner and the work of the Dutch professor in phenomenological history (‘metabletics’) Jan Hendrik van den Berg and other phenomenological philosophers.  But most of all it is especially by applying the phenomenological approach of Goethe that I manage to bridge the chasm between spirituality and the humanities on the one hand and positivistic natural science on the other hand. Above all I employ this method on the domain of the pre-natal development of the human being.

A third area, which has had my interest for many years, is that of the human body. I published ’Lost Death’, a critical essay about the current image of the body in medical science.  At present I work as senior lecturer for anatomy and embryology at the University of Maastricht (The Netherlands) and as free lance teacher at various training courses in the field of ’alternative’ or ’complementary’ medicine, such as yoga-schooling, schooling for art therapy and ante-natal support, moreover the training in osteopathy, Craniosacral Therapy and Polarity Medicine. I give seminars ’Embryo in Motion’ for laymen as well as for professionally interested people as doctors, midwives and other therapists and to an increasing extent to professional groups as osteopaths, craniosacral therapists, trauma therapists, and so on. For those latter activities there is more time available since 2005 because I am since then connected  with the university Maastricht as Part Time Lecturer, so I established the company Dynamension. In that context I travel all over the world with the project Embryo in Motion searching for people who want to hear about what we actually are doing when we are embryo. On the search for spirit in our (embryonic) existence.

Via the phenomenological approach of the dynamic morphology I found a bridge between science and spirituality. Via my network  Embryo in Motion I try to  propagate this view as an ‘embryologist on the search for spirit’. Since March 2012 I  have retired from university and in the context of Dynamension, a project initiated by me, I now am able to completely dedicate me to my work on Embryo in Motion.

The Embryo in Us. Portland OR USA 2013 Presented by Cosmoanelixis Greece in English EN

Jaap in action? Almelo 2015 NL

Of in English? About the heart as a head EN